Abstract
Dual Credit, also known as dual enrollment or concurrent enrollment, has been offered at colleges and universities since the 1970s (Kim & Bragg, 2008). Dual credit programs allow students to take college-level courses while still in high school and receive both college and high school credit for successful completion of the courses. While much research has been done into the overall effects dual credit programs have on students’ future success in post-secondary settings, little research has been conducted to understand the effects of completing dual credit first-year writing courses on writing success. This study was framed by social cognitive theory and measured students’ writing self-efficacy to determine writing success. Focused on students taking the second in a two-course sequence of first-year writing courses at a land grant university in the northwest, the results of the study suggested that there was not a difference among the mean writing self-efficacy scores of students who earned college credit for the first course in a two-course first-year writing sequence through dual credit or AP exams before coming to the university and students who did not earn college credit for the course before coming to university. Furthermore, the study determined that there was not a difference among mean writing self-efficacy scores of students who completed a college-level dual credit writing course during their junior year of high school or their senior year of high school. Finally, there was no difference among the mean writing self-efficacy scores of students who earned credit for the first course in a two-course first-year writing sequence through successful completion of AP English Language and Composition or English Literature and Composition and students who earned credit for the course through dual credit coursework. Overall, the results show that the three studied pathways students in this study took to the second course in the two-course sequence did not have a significant effect on their writing self-efficacy scores. Discussion regarding implications for practice and a model action plan are provided.